Archive for the ‘First Nations’ Category

With the Native Day of Action upon the universal us, I wanted to get a few thoughts out. I’d say before the onslaught of media/mediated blather on the subject, but the river of ink has been flowing for months now. I’d also say corporate media blather, but there are a number of tributaries flowing into the main. The leftist media and the others are also helping to confuse the issue. I say confuse the issue fully aware that the issue is confusing, and anyone whose mind’s made up, should smash that wall of thought to pieces and start over again. I’ll end this little prelude by repeating that native issues are confusing, and the thoughts I’m about to write out are far from finished.

“If the blockade strategy goes ahead, one thing is certain: There will be rivers of ink spilled explaining that, while native grievances are legitimate, there is no excuse for such disruptive tactics.”
Naomi Klein

“I hope we will be marching for first nations rights with Canadians from all walks of life.” Phil Fontaine

“The protesters’ grievances center on unsettled native land claims. They have nothing to do with helping the aboriginal people who suffer under a system that lets small groups of vested interests rule.” The Globe and Mail

The Naomi Klein quote comes from the May 4th Globe and Mail, you could read the article yourself, but it’ll cost you. in that article she writes,

Mr Brant has a different message for non-native Canada – don’t just listen to us, join us. He points out that Canadians, even those who tell themselves they support native rights, “still treat them as a government problem.”

It was the “join us” line that I wanted to write about. You know that feeling when you want to say something, feel something needs to be said, but you’re not completely sure how to write it? I thought about sending a letter, but what can be said in 250 words?

The above quote from the Globe and Mail comes from an editorial on May 30. I mention this after asking what can be said in 250 words, because anything that goes against conventional wisdom, anything that isn’t a part of our national schema is meaningless if it can’t be grounded in readers’ minds.

I support indigenous rights, which are different from human rights, because they expand notions of human and community. I support the difference because it destroys the notion of equality that confines us to the same. What could that possibly mean to someone who could write “a system that lets small groups of vested interests rule” and not feel the cold irony of his own situation?

Indigenous people are defined by the land they inhabit, are bound by the land. When they are removed from the land they cease to be indigenous. Land is everything, to the first nations, because without it they are nothing.

Perry McLeod-Shabogesic, a Nipissing First Nation councillor, said that while they support other forms of action being taken nationwide June 29, Nipissing First Nation’s current situation would be best served by educating not only the general public of North Bay, West Nipissing and elsewhere, but also themselves.

“The politicians are the instrument, but it’s the people that are the power. And we want to make sure we give them enough information so that when they’re forming their opinions, that they have at least a well-balanced perspective on it,” McLeod-Shabogesic said. “When they go to vote, hopefully our issues are included in theirs.”

His reminder to include ourselves in the process of education is worth repeating.

I’ve been thinking about the coming blockade action, and am at a point where I’ve lost complete control. I have no answer, not that I expected to write one, but as well I have no convictions. That said my head isn’t all that empty. I’m not indigenous to this land, so my role can never be more than that of a spectator or at most a philosophical ally.

So why am I bothering to think the situation through? If nothing else just to answer that question. But somehow this situation will shed some light on Canadian education. The concepts of identity, nationality, culture and difference are alive in this situation, and education, any discussion of education needs to be shaped with these recently sharpened conceptual tools.

Is this some sort of personal fixation? No. This bothers me. Ibbitson returns to the subject of native education with another call for subjugating natives through education. Education becomes a weapon for continued conquest, consensus is a synonym for assimilation.

In State of the nation: It’s about consensus and accommodation (A4) Thursday, March 29, 2007, Ibbitson writes:

Where we don’t have consensus we must fight to achieve it. Canada’s Indian, Inuit, Métis and other aboriginal populations try to talk to the rest of us, but we don’t understand them and they don’t understand us. After almost five years of writing on this subject, I am convinced that only a national commitment to improving educational outcomes, while respecting Native control over key elements of the curriculum will make it possible for both sides to hear what the other is saying, which is the essential first step toward consensus.

Why do we need to “fight” for consensus? Why do we need consensus at all if the First Nations are self governing? If “we” don’t understand “them”, why is it only they need the education? What does “educational outcomes” mean if it leads to the “first step toward consensus“?

The way Ibbitson uses the word “Canada” to define the aboriginal populations exposes his bias. This is why the question : How Canadian are you? bothers me. Canada is not something that defines us. We define Canada.

As a Canadian who takes as fact the First Nations’ responsibility for their own lives and communities, I’d like to answer John Ibbitson’s question, “So what are you doing to help them reach that independence?”

First and finally, I’m not suggesting we take away their autonomy regarding self-education. Integration is not, as he writes, “the only solution.” The last time Ibbitson made this suggestion (Dec. 21/06) Phil Fontaine (national chief, Assembly of First Nations) replied, “our dedicated leaders and educational professionals have developed a plan that will more effectively meet our needs.”

It wasn’t printed.

Just as a note, I use “we” (italicized in the letter) very self consciously. Ibbitson draws his readers into this “we.” He writes:

Let’s say to each other: We will bring status and non-status Indian, Inuit and Métis high-school completion rates up to national average in this generation, and we will not let jurisdictional disputes, funding shortfalls or anything else keep us from reaching that goal. And we will hold our politicians, our native leadership and most important ourselves to account.

I am a part of this we, and bothered by the inclusion. I become an actor in a conspiracy, a conspiracy I want no part of, and must respond with “we.” And there is a conspiracy here. “Integrating native schools into the provincial school systems is the only solution,” A conspiracy against First Nations autonomy.

Another note, When Fontaine writes “our dedicated leadership” and Ibbitson writes “our native leadership” the same possessive pronoun refers to different groups.

And another note: Ibbitson writes:

Those close to the issue are shaking their heads. They know the federal government would never surrender jurisdiction, the provincial governments would never agree to assume it and native leaders would never give up control.

We’re shaking our heads in Ibbitson’s mind because of what we know? But he’s proposed the solution, what he goes on to call the only solution:

The solution would be for Ottawa and native leaders to let provincial governments — who actually know how to run an education system — assume full responsibility for native schools.

For the record I’m not shaking my head, but if I were it wouldn’t be for the reasons Ibbitson puts forth. First is the repeated proposal of integration that Ibbitson is making. There’s a question; What are his intentions? The last time he made the suggestion the native response was clear, they’ve got it under control. So this second proposal, essentially ignoring the First Nations response, has got to be questioned. I don’t have an answer, just a question; What are his intentions?

Next, the interjection, “who actually know how to run a school system,” might provide the answer to why Ibbitson ignores the First Nations response. The First Nations are obviously not “who” for Ibbitson. This is actually offensive. All the more so, when you consider the influence the provincial education systems have had in the north. The provincial education system doesn’t work for low income kids.

And third, why wouldn’t the federal government want to drop this hot potato? Why wouldn’t the provincial governments take the money? Most kids fly out for high school already, integration wouldn’t be much of a change. These two objections are fabrications to make it look like the First Nations aren’t the only ones who don’t want this.

The First Nations are in an excellent position to experiment within education and find different practices that work in their many different communities, languages and cultures. There can not be an “only solution” when it comes to education in the north.

A couple days ago John Ibbitson wrote “Native education is in crisis, and it’s everyone’s failure” in the Globe and Mail. In the column under the pretense of education he pushes for a move on native governance. He writes, “Provincial governments know how to deliver education, and would do the best job of running native education programs.”

I’d suggest Ibbitson look a little more critically into the ideas on which he so comfortably rests. Provincial governments are failing to educate children from lower economic situations. There are studies that show this. So sending provincial programs into these economically deprived areas will only reveal our education system for what it is.

Today native education is modeled on provincial programs. That’s why it’s failing. Studies show that children of university graduates are more likely to go to university. Others show that children who are read to daily perform better in school than children who are not. And children in low income situations are less likely to have an educated parent. Those low income children are also less likely to have a parent who reads to them. It’s clear that a child’s success or failure can be accurately predicted by what is happening outside the school. That’s because provincial schools simply exercise the education children receive at home.

If child who isn’t educated at home will not succeed in school, what exactly is happening in schools? Our education system doesn’t work. It fails to educate the poorest students in the provincial system, and as it is modeled in native communities it fails there also. If you look at the professions that matter, architecture, medicine, law, for example, and compare their training to the eight months a teacher sails through, you can see that teaching doesn’t stack up. Qualification, in the case of teachers, does not translate as ability. The reality is that ability to teach isn’t necessary for qualification. Kids come to school with the skills that are being exercised in the classroom, or they fail. There is no teaching. And when these kids fail, we are all failing. Imagine an architect who’s been hired to build on poor soil. Our society needs building to stand up so we’ve got a collection of over-educated constantly learning professionals working to rigid standards, who are strictly judged and highly regarded for what they do. If the building fails, the architects and the engineers fail. Because of this there are a variety of building techniques for building on a variety of surfaces.

That the tools to educate are traditional as opposed to scientific, that the duration of teacher training is about an eighth of the highly regarded professions, and that standards of education slip while the standards in other professions rise, speaks more strongly to the crisis in Native education, the education of Canada’s underclass, than any allocation of funds. An analogy would be throwing money at front line doctors to cure a disease before the treatment has been developed.

"The very moment philosophers proclaim ownership of their ideas, they are allying themselves to the powers they are criticizing."

"At the risk of seeming ridiculous, let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love. It is impossible to think of a genuine revolutionary lacking this quality." — Che Guevara